Impact of retailer Christmas sales performance on future performance

Retailers published their Christmas sales figures recently and again some performed better than others. What do sales figures mean in terms of future sales though? Can a good result cause a domino effect resulting in even more sales? We asked shoppers where and why they shopped for Christmas and how they feel about retailers’ Christmas sales figures.

16% of shoppers say they didn’t do a main shop for Christmas. Of those who did 88% say they used their normal grocery store and 12% shopped somewhere else. Of those who shopped somewhere else for their Christmas food shop the main reasons for doing this included using a variety of stores for different products. Quality and price were both determinants of store choice. The most cited reason was using a variey of store for different products.

The proportion of shoppers switching to another store for better quality or for shopping around for promotions was pretty much equal. The effect of the tendency to trade up or shop around for deals was visible in the retailer sales figures over the Christmas period. Both ends of the price spectrum, the discounters and Waitrose, recorded strong performance in the weeks leading up to Christmas.

Do shoppers pay attention to the retailers’ sales performance then and does it influence where they shop? Of those who had heard the grocery retailers’ Christmas sales figures just over half (52%) said they weren’t influenced by them. Considering this, almost as many (48%) say they are influenced by the sales performance of retailers to some extent.

Retailers’ Christmas performance – How Did They Do?

The competition for festive shoppers started weeks before Christmas. How did each retailer do? The Kantar Worldpanel figures reveal that overall the grocery market grew by 3.2% in the 12 weeks leading to 23 December. The strongest performances were recorded at both ends of the price spectrum. Comparison of retailer performances isn’t however quite straightforward as the results vary depending on the time period in question. Each retailer have released their own figures for different time periods. To make the comparison simpler and more objective, we use the Kantar Worldpanel 12 weeks to 23 December like-for-like data.

Sainsbury’s was again the only one of the big four retailers that managed to increase their market share compared to last year. In the 12 weeks leading to 23 December Sainsbury’s experienced the highest growth but in the 4 weeks before Christmas it was Tesco  that took the spotlight.
 

Tesco bounced back from last year’s poor festive performance with their like-for-like sales in the 12 weeks to 23 December increasing by 2.9% (4.2% for the 4 week to 25 December). In the same period Sainsbury’s growth was 3.4% and Asda increased their sales by 2.2%. Morrisons was the only one of the big four retailers to report a drop in like for like sales in the 12 weeks leading to 23 December, 0.6% compared to the previous year.

The discounters on the other hand were the real winners of Christmas 2012 showing very strong performance. Traditionally discounters have lost out on their share of the Christmas shopping as shoppers have tended to trade up in the past. Aldi increased their sales by 30.1% and hit their highest ever market share of 3.2%. Also Lidl and Iceland performed well, with 10.8% and 9.7% growth rates respectively. Shoppers didn’t however just go for the lowest price. At the other end of the price spectrum Waitrose recorded a strong performance and increased their sales from last year (5.4%).

 

Check out our thought piece on the impact of Christmas sales figures on future performance here